Man City keeps dying title hopes alive with stylish win over Chelsea

Man City goalie Joe Hart stopped Frank Lampard on a second-half penalty kick to preserve his shutout.

Lee Smith/ZumaPress.com

LONDON (AP) ? Manchester City revived its faint title hopes by ending a month-long wait for a Premier League win, beating Chelsea 2-0 on Sunday to stay 12 points behind Manchester United.

Yaya Toure and Carlos Tevez scored second-half goals as City wore down the third-place visitors at Etihad Stadium with one of the team's most convincing displays of the season.

"We can't think it's finished with 11 games to go,'' City manager Roberto Mancini said. "It's not my mentality or the mentality of the players.''

Outclassed for the most part, it could have been so different for Chelsea had Frank Lampard's low penalty been saved by Joe Hart in the 52nd minute when the score was 0-0.

After missing a chance to move a point behind City, the European champions could be overtaken on Monday by Tottenham, which visits West Ham. Arsenal is only two points behind Chelsea in the race for the final Champions League spots.

"When you lose you have to be disappointed and this game was important for us because we could have been closer to Man City,'' Chelsea manager Rafael Benitez said. "But we cannot give up, we have to carry on, try to win our games and get close.''

France internationals Moussa Sissoko and Yohan Cabaye capped Newcastle's self-designated "French Day'' by scoring goals in a 4-2 win over Southampton in the other league match, lifting the team clear of relegation trouble.

Home fans donned berets and black-and-white striped T-shirts in celebration of the club's 10-strong French contingent, seven of whom were in the match-day squad on Sunday, but it was one of Southampton's French players - Morgan Schneiderlin - who scored the opening goal.

Sissoko equalized and Papiss Cisse have Newcastle the lead with a dipping volley, only for Rickie Lambert to level for Southampton with his 12th goal of the campaign.

Cabaye's penalty and Jos Hooiveld's own goal clinched a victory which puts Newcastle six points out of the drop zone and condemned Southampton to only a second loss in 10 matches.

Fourth-tier club Bradford plays Swansea in the League Cup final later Sunday.

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